This section is intended to introduce the reader to various aspects of art, which may be related to various aspects of the present invention that are described and/or claimed below. This discussion is believed to be helpful in providing the reader with background information to facilitate a better understanding of the various aspects of the present invention. Accordingly, it should be understood that these statements are to be read in this light, and not as admissions of prior art.
A network router usually functions as a gateway connecting a local area network to the Internet. It is configured with the proper settings including an either dynamic or fixed public IP address. It performs Network Address Translation (NAT), defined in the IETF RFC 3022, between the local network private IP addresses and the public Internet IP address. In addition it contains a local network IP address and typically contains a DHCP server function to dynamically assign IP addresses to all devices on the local network.
The gateway is usually managed by a Management Server located on the network via a management protocol such as DSL Forum TR-069 or the Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP). The TR-069 is specified in “DSL Forum Technical Report, TR-069 Amendment 1, CPE WAN Management Protocol, dated November 2006”. SNMP is specified in the IETF RFC 1157. The Management Server is managed and controlled by an Internet service provider.
To reduce the number of helpdesk calls and overall installation and service problems, the service providers typically rely upon diagnostics and troubleshooting tools. These tools aim at providing relevant diagnostics information and possibly performing active troubleshooting tests, such as device and service availability tests. The gateway then plays an important and central role in providing local network diagnostics and troubleshooting capabilities under control of a management server. The gateway collects information about the home network devices based upon passive collection of device information such as hardware and IP address, status and connection time. In particular, it can get information from the gateway DHCP server lease table.
The monitoring and diagnostics at the service provider consists in the collection of relevant local network device information. In particular, information on hardware and IP addresses, operating system and web browser used enables a helpdesk to support a customer. It helps to diagnose any home networking problem such as lack of Internet access.
To be able to retrieve information from home network devices, existing solutions rely upon local network device installation of software programs. These software programs usually run on a computer or on device operating system. They collect relevant device information. They optionally use this information for pro-active troubleshooting. They optionally communicate this information to the service provider. An example of such a solution is the Network Magic software (Registered Trademark) from Pure Networks. It permits to discover the home network and provide a local based overview of the home network.
Relying upon such software programs is not user friendly and may pose problems. It requires installing a software program on each device of the local network. Each Operating System needs a compatible program to be created and supported by the devices on the local network. The tool is dependent on software; whenever installation of the software fails, there is no information available at the service provider.